how big of a pain is it to change the heater core for a yj. so here is the story i was driving stopped to get gas and a ***** load of water was comming out of my passanger side firewall.so is it tough to replace its a 88 jeep wrangler 4.2 inline 6

had posted this before and got flamed, so I deleted it. I figured at the time, I was either going to get a "cool, that will help" or "what an idiot response" After someone else started a whole new thread on "How i do chang a heter", complete with "i dont now, me get my bok"responses, I figured it might be a little too low tech.
However, since a couple of people PM'd me, we have some newbies out there, and a few who are freezing their butts off and want to change out their heater core with as few surprises as possible, I'll put it back up. I am happy to report my skin is a little thicker now! HTH.

Not a very exciting mod, but cooler than a passenger floorboard full of antifreeze or freezing your ***** off. Below are the steps to help speed up the process.

1. Drain Coolant (even if you are only changing the motor. The whole assembly has to come out)
2. Disconnect heater hoses
3. Disconnect vent door cables (3 of them. Two in front, one on the side of the housing between said housing and body. One below passenger side speaker. (Unscrew the nut and slide the whole thing off each shaft.)
4. Disconnect blower motor wire. (On top of housing, center, 2 blade plug.)
5. Disconnect defroster duct. (I just loosened up the bottom clamp and removed it after the housing was out of the way.)
6. Remove nuts that attach heater housing studs to the engine compartment side of the dash panel. (This is where the pictures might help out.)

First off, remove the Battery and tray. There are four studs that hold it to the firewall, and two that attach it to the fender that are all 1/2 inch. The fuse box can be removed from the battery tray without disconnecting any wires. Three of the bolts are under the tray, and one is behind the valve cover, on the driver side. All of the nuts are the same size, 7/16. See pics.

7. Remove heater housing assembly by tiling it downward, to disengage it from the defroster duct. Pull it rearward and out from under the instrument panel.
Attached Images